Immigration and occupational transitions in Spain

Mikolaj Stanek, Universidad Complutense de Madrid
Alberto Veira, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid

Most of the existing analysis of labour market integration of immigrants compares native and immigrant workers occupational attainment. However, much less attention has been paid to occupational transition experienced while moving from origin to the destination countries. Several studies show that migration often implies occupational downgrading and that its patterns vary depending on sex, country of origin, human and social capital, and cultural and features The purpose of our presentation is to use recently released data from 6.975 non-natives residents in Spain drawn from the Spanish National Immigrant Survey of 2007 (ENI) to answer the following questions: Which proportion of migrants who entered the Spanish labour market have actually suffered occupational downgrading? Which socio-demographic profiles are more prone to occupational downgrading? Profiles have been be constructed controlling by sex, region of origin, education, job characteristics (brunch of industry and occupational status) before and after migration and migrant social network.